Thursday, February 20, 2014

The Ukraine Crisis: The Russian Angle, Scenarios, and the ghost of 1914

The "Ukraine Crisis" that erupted a few days ago has
been smouldering beneath the surface for years, with the current
anti-government (Pro-European) protests ongoing for three months.

The initial cause of those protests was the rejection of the government
of further EU agreements, in favour of greater economic co-operation with
Russia; the deeper reason was endemic corruption of the governing
administration.

On one side, there is the incumbent (pro-Russian) government,
supported by Russia; on the other, are the "pro-European" (and
pro-EU) opposition, backed by the EU and the USA.

Now the situation has turned to armed violence in the centre of
Kiev, with the situation unravelling in the regions, especially those dominated
by the largely Ukrainian-speaking opposition in the west and north. Even
Crimea, an ethnically Russian region on the Black that also hosts Russia's
Black Sea fleet, has threatened to secede and join Russia if things get much
worse.

On the one hand, the West has decisively thrown its lot in with
the opposition, supporting sanctions against the government; on the other hand,
Russia has decisively thrown its full support behind the government (what that
means precisely at this stage is unclear), calling the opposition "fascists",
and the EU's demands "blackmail".

Seen through a Russian lens

Ukraine broke away from Russia (then the Soviet Union) a little
over twenty years ago, but Russia has only really took Ukraine as being
nominally independent ever since. The reasons for this are cultural and
historical; regardless of what Ukrainians (Russian-speaking or not) may think
of it, the Russians still consider Ukraine to be firmly part of Russia's sphere
of influence.

Apart from Ukraine and the break-up of the former Soviet Union
twenty years ago, Russia's perspective on the current Ukraine Crisis must be
considered in relation to recent actions in Russia's back-yard, and areas of
Russian influence in general.

From this point of view, we must go back to the Balkans. The
break-up of Yugoslavia in the early 1990s and the wars in Bosnia and Kosovo
resulted in the collapse of the Milosevic government in Belgrade, Russia's last
firm ally in the Balkans.

Moving on to the 21st century, you had the Orange Revolution in
Ukraine in the middle of the first decade, as well as the Rose Revolution in
Georgia, both bring pro-Western governments on to Russia's doorstep. Regardless
of the exaggerated Russian paranoia at these events, these both happening only
a couple of years after their neighbouring Baltic States has joined NATO (as a
result of the "War On Terror"), it meant that Russia had very few
"friendly" nations left around it.

Furthermore, with China rapidly growing in stature, Russia had
also lost economic influence in Central Asia; and the USA was using the
"War On Terror" to utilise military bases in places like Uzbekistan.
By this point, Russian paranoia of "encirclement" begins to gain an
element of credence.

Things began to hot up in 2008. Early in that year, Kosovo
declared independence from Serbia, Russia's one-time ally. Russia supported
Serbia's protests, and in the end only a modest number of countries recognised
the new nation's sovereignty.

However, Russia got its own back soon afterwards, by unilaterally
accepting the independence of two breakaway (Russian-speaking) regions of
Georgia; then when the pro-Western Georgian President, Saakashvili, ordered the
"reclaiming" of those two regions while Vladimir Putin was watching
the opening ceremony of the Beijing Summer Olympic Games, Russia had reason to
believe they were being taken for fools, regardless of Saakashvili's claims of
Russian provocation. A brief war led to those regions being kept firmly from
Georgian control, with the West unwilling to directly intervene; only Russian
restraint, under pressure from the West to cease hostilities, allowed
Saakashvili to remain in power.

The "Arab Spring" that began in early 2011 brought
another challenge to Russia's "perspective" on the world. During the
Cold War, the Middle East has been as much a battleground for influence has any
other part of the world, and Russia's friendly relations with Syria (and
Russia's naval base on the Syrian coast) have been the still-fruitful product
of that.

The UN-backed war against Libya in 2011 was considered a dastardly
trick by the West on Russia, hoodwinking them into backing what would
ultimately be the collapse of the anti-Western (and implicitly, pro-Russian)
government of Gaddafi.

Thus, last summer, when the US, France and the UK supported
military action against the savage crimes of the Syrian (pro-Russian)
government during its ongoing civil war, Russia did everything it could to
prevent it from happening, successfully keeping their sole remaining ally in
the Middle East from harm.

Russia's geopolitical positioning since the end of the Cold War
has been to promote the status quo in the developing world,
and non-interference in the internal affairs of other countries. Naturally,
this is because it is in Russia's interests to do so. This follows also with relations
with Iran, as Russia has been playing its part to be "helpful" to
both Iran and the West.

It is from this chain of events that we get a better perspective
of Russian thinking. Seen through this lens, Ukraine represents to the Russian
administration something more like a "red line" that cannot be
crossed. After the perceived humiliations, encirclement and loss of allies in
the last fifteen years, Ukraine is Russia's last "big prize", along
with Syria. It has naval assets it both countries. The Orange Revolution led to
a short-lived pro-Western government; the current (pro-Russian) government
replaced it in the following elections.

Politically, strategically and culturally, it cannot afford to
"lose" Ukraine.

Russian paranoia about Western-backed "fascists"
attempting a coup against the pro-Russian government therefore has a long
history to back it up. The timing of the violence, happening during the Winter
Olympics in Sochi, would be seen as no coincidence in Moscow; neither would the
fact that the US military sent a surveillance boat to the Black Sea to help
with "anti-terrorism".

Ghosts of 1914

The hundredth anniversary of the start of the First World War
brings back some uncomfortable parallels to the current situation in Ukraine.

It should be remembered that the spark that led to the war
starting was in the Balkans: A Bosnian Serb nationalist, backed by elements of
the Serbian military and government, killed the heir to Austria-Hungary. Russia
supported Serbia, encouraging her to reject the demands of Austria.

What is important here is the role of Russia; without Russia's
support, Serbia would likely have given in to Austrian demands (which,
incidentally, where modest compared to those that NATO demanded of
Serbia/Yugoslavia in 1999; while Austria was looking for a way to humiliate
Serbia, it still gave plenty of room for Serbia to wriggle out of war). In this
respect, Russia shares a large part of the blame for escalating the situation:
first, by telling Serbia to stand up against Austrian aggression; second, by
creating the narrative orthodoxy (regardless of the truth) for the reasons for
the war in the first place i.e. Austrian aggression, which gave France and
Britain a reason to join on Russia's side.

Jump forward a century, and we see much the same narrative played
out again, albeit in the theatre of Ukraine and not Serbia, with the West
(EU/USA) playing the role of Austria against Russia. Like in 1914, Russia
accuses the West of aggression and blackmail with its demands on its ally; and
also like in 1914, by Russia encouraging the Ukrainian government to
"stand firm" and offering its full support, it risks escalating the
situation further.

It should also be remembered that the years preceding the First
World War included various "crises" and regional wars; the Balkan
Wars of 1912 and 1913, like the unrest in the Middle East since the "Arab
Spring" resulted in unpredictable and unstable politics in
strategically-important countries.

In this way, we see that Russia's perspective has never really
changed; only the situation has.

Three scenarios

Where will this lead? Three possibilities offer themselves.

The optimistic scenario:

Government ministers soon withdraw their support from the
President, forcing him to do a deal with the opposition. Mediation with
both Russia and the West working with both sides to calm the situation. At
present, this looks unlikely, at least in the short-term; violence is
intensifying as the two camps are drifting apart.

The middling scenario:

Low-level violence continues for some weeks, until ministers tire
of the chaos, and encourage both Russia and the West to mediate.

The worst-case scenario:

Civil war erupts, with Crimea seceding. Russia decides to
intervene directly to protect its strategic interests, as Ukraine represents
its "last line of defence"; the West's response depends on the level
of influence that "hawks" have in the EU nations and Washington.
Hawks in the West may argue for a strong response after being denied by Russia
a "just war" in Syria the previous year.

Although last this scenario looks far-fetched, the psychology of
the various players in the West is important; Obama's rhetoric against Russia
in the Ukraine Crisis has thus far been (uncharacteristically) very strong. In
this way, perhaps the thought of "missing out" on a strike against
Syria is playing on his mind?

On such things can wars be decided.

A further analysis of the situation in Ukraine (and Moscow's intentions) can be found here.